Improvement in iron pavements



snow Iron Pavements Patented Oct. 13, 1874.

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THE GRAPHIO C0,?HDTD-LITK398-4-l PARK PLACE,N.Y

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

GEORGE -K. SNOW, OF WATERTOWN, MASSACHUSETTS.

IMPROVEMENT IN IRON PAVEMENTS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 155,992, dated October 13, 1874; application filed February 20, 1872.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, Gno. K. SNOW, of Watertown, in the county of Middlesex and State of Massachusetts, have invented new and useful Improvements in Metallic Pavements, of which the following is a specification:

My invention relates to the form of a metallic paving-block, and the manner of uniting a series of said blocks in a pavement; and it consists in giving to said blocks a cruciform shape, the four arms of the same being made tapering from the top toward the bottom. It also consists in a peculiar formation of the extremities of said arms, by which each block, when set in its place with its fellows, shall have a bearing upon four other blocks,'and four other blocks shall have a bearing upon it, as will be further described.

Figure l of the drawings is a plan of my improved paving-block. Figs. 2 and 3 are elevations of the same, viewed from standpoints 90 distant from each other. Fig. 4 is a plan of a section of pavement as it appears when laid, the dotted line w w thereon indicating the direction of travel over the same; and Fig. 5 is a vertical section on line 2 2 on Fig. 4.

A is the center of the block, from which four arms, B, B, G, and C, radiate at equal distances from each other, said arms being made tapering from the top to the bottom, as shown. The arms B and B have a portion of their upper sides cut away at their outer ends equal to half their thickness in the direction of their length, as shown at a a. The arms 0 and O are each cut shorter than B and B for the greater part of their height, but have a lip or projection, b, at their upper edges of a length equal to onehalf their thickness, and so formed as to fit the recess formed in the line of metal when two of the arms B and B are placed end to end, said lip 12 reaching half-way across B, and a corresponding lip on another block filling the other half of said recess and abutting against 7), as shown in Fig. 4. The cavities formed by the arms of the block, when placed in position on the road-bed, are to be rammed or tamped full of gravel or other suitable packing material, as shown at E E in Figs. 4 and 5. Curved recesses c c are formed in the upper edges of the arms B, B, G, and U, for the purpose of giving foothold for horses.

These blocks are so small in width that an ordinary horses foot will more than cover one.

Among other advantages of the use of my improved pavement are, cheapness of manufacture, as compared with other metallic pavements greaterdurability than wood asmoother surface than stone; facility in taking up and relaying, in case of repairs to Water or gas pipes or sewers; and facility of raising the blocks to their proper level, when the surface becomes uneven, by tamping gravel through the opening in the blocks, the ramming ofsaid gravel causing it to lift the block by impinging upon the tapered side of the ribs.

What I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States, is-

A metallic paving-block made with four arms, in the form of a cross, and provided with the recesses a and lips b, substantially as described.

Executed at Boston this 15th day of February, 1872.

GEO. K. SNOW.

Witnesses:

N. G. LOMBARD, FRANK K. BoGERs. 

